Bob Bradley met with Sunil Gulati yesterday to discuss his future as national coach but reportedly nothing was resolved. His coaching contract runs out in December and in between there are friendlies against Poland and Colombia. USSF is probably going to come to a decision in the next few weeks.
There are no viable candidates to replace him other than rumoured links to the likes of Juergen Klinsmann and Jose Pekerman. On Bradley's part he has played it down both sides- saying that he would be honoured to continue to coach the US national team but also would welcome the challenge of coaching overseas preferably in the Premiership. In this regard he was linked to Fulham and now more strongly with Aston Villa.
As per Landon Donovan, he feels that Bradley will not continue and Sunil Gulati made it clear that he considered the loss against Ghana unsatisfactory.
There is also the question of Bradley's level of motivation. This in partly topographical - the USA has put so much distance between itself and the rest of the CONCACAF challengers that World Cup qualification is almost always assured. There are few challenges to regional supremacy other than Mexico.
Before the CONCACAF Gold Cup in 1991, the USA had just made it to the finals just once in the previous version- the CONCACAF Championships. The Gold Cup now held every two years has seen a Mexico vs USA final four times. In total, the US has made it to 7 finals winning 4 of those. It's a two horse race in the CONCACAF.
Mexico is the occasional motivating factor - no US coach would like to slip up against their most serious rivals. But we have moved on from that milestone which in itself is not enough to base a decision to continue or to give an extension on the contract. In the absence of any real benchmarks this World Cup performance assumed paramount significance and that really remains the reason for this coaching limbo. In short, Bradley may have run out of challenges.
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